Tuesday, April 14, 2009

There is an ad I see fairly often on "pbs kids." It shows a little paper person kicking a ball and the little paper person kicks the ball off the table onto the floor. The little paper person goes to the edge of the table and leans over to look at the ball far below, unable to reach it. But then, a chain of little paper people are revealed as they unfold from the first little paper person. They retreive the ball by unfolding all the way down to the floor. Once on top of the table again, the little paper people form a circle and the kick the ball to each other. The announcer says, "Connections make life meaningful."

I saw this ad for perhaps the 50th time on Tuesday. (Yes, my son really does watch that much t.v.)

The Spirit confirms to me that personal connections do make life meaningful, but even more than that, that spiritually, we are connected:

That our individual welfare is linked to others and we are to help one another, That our Heavenly Father answers our prayers through other people, That we are instruments in His hands to answer other people’s prayers, And that when we kick the ball off the table, we need not, and cannot, retrieve by ourselves. And although it is through our direct relationship with the Savior that we are saved or helped, often other people are supposed to be involved in the process.

Developing understanding of this personal-interconnectedness is perhaps the biggest lesson I have been learning while we live in Lubbock.

B. and I are often--continually?--blessed by the generosity of others and their willingness to listen and obey heavenly promptings. It is both daunting and happy to hope to become like them--to be one of the little paper people in the chain that retrieves the ball.

And I hope that through regular temple attendance and spiritual progress, I can become more capable of the love it takes to be a good servant.